Plan and document

KTH’s Guidelines on Managing Research Data  (pdf)

Still not sure where to start? Contact us at researchdata@kth.se.

Documenting Your Research Project: What, Why, and How

Properly documenting the different steps in your research project from the very start helps both you and other stakeholders:

• It helps you to remember the decisions that you’ve made and the steps taken
• It makes the processes, results, and data understandable for other researchers interested in your results, your data and your methods.
• It helps you to comply with guidelines, regulations and requirements from funders and publishers that might apply to your research.

What Should You Document for your project?

The simple answer to this question is that you should document decisions, research activities, data and methods.

Some concrete examples:

• Legal, ethical, and other considerations, including potential restrictions to data use
• Contracts, applications, and approvals, like consent forms and ethics approvals.
• How you have collected, modelled and/or created data
• Minutes from project meetings
• Central project information like aim, methods, how data was processed/analysed

More information about metadata

Metadata is data about data and helps data discovery and cataloguing. Many disciplines have their own metadata standards. Metadata standards help researchers in that discipline communicate the same kinds of information in a standard way, when sharing and publishing data. There are also general metadata standards like DublinCore , which includes 15 terms.

If you’d like to learn more about metadata and metadata standards that might be applicable for you, the Metadata Standards Catalogue  might help you find a relevant schema for you.

What should be included in a readme file?

A detailed, and well-constructed readme file helps facilitate understanding and potentially reuse of your data set. Some examples of the information you should include in your readme file are:

• Data manager(s), creator(s), and their affiliation(s)
• Purpose of the research
• Information about the folder structure and how folders related to one another
• File formats and software needed to read them
• Glossary for abbreviations and file naming conventions used
• Information about units of measurement
• Steps taken to collect, process, and/or analyse data
• Information about data provenance, if relevant

If you’re unsure how to structure the readme, or would like to see a template, see SciLifeLab's template .

Don’t forget to update readme files as the circumstances of your project change! We also recommend including supplementary readme files in your folder structure if your dataset is particularly large and/or includes a lot of variation, like multiple, different datasets. 

Documenting with a Data Management Plan

One way of getting started with documenting your research data is through a data management plan. A data management plan is required by many external funders and recommended in KTH’s guidelines for managing research data. But it is foremost a useful tool for you to plan, revise, and revisit throughout the project. Think of a data management plan as a living document: a place where you can document revisions made throughout the research process. This can help you revisit project parameters, data, and methods to reuse, plan, and execute new projects.

If you are in a larger project with several collaborators, it is also an excellent way to document and outline areas of responsibility and reflect over challenges that come up, or how you want to handle unexpected results.

KTH has a tool for making a data management plan called DMP Online. The Research Data Team at KTH Library can review your data management plan and advise, if you get in touch with us at researchdata@kth.se.

Log in to DMP Online

Learn more about data management plans

For more instructions and guides about data management plans and DMP Online, please review the section on Data Management Plans  in KTH Library's course on Open Science and Research Data Management  (requires login to Canvas).

Things to Consider Before Starting Your Research Project

While there are many things to think about before starting your project, there are some important considerations related to ethics, legal and information security frameworks that you might need to consider.

A national guide that provides a general overview of good research practice is published by the Swedish Science council.

As a researcher you are responsible for conducting research according to good research practice and respect ethical and legal boundaries.

Read more on support on ethical considerations at KTH .

Does this feel overwhelming to do yourself? Contact researchdata@kth.se and we can help you or connect you with someone who can!

You can also read more on legal and information security considerations.

• Recommendations for working with sensitive data
• Legal aspects regarding research data
• Export control - in collaborations involving sensitive technology

For further support

• How to plan for data management and document data in your project, contact researchdata@kth.se
• On funding agency requirements on project documentation that is necessary for reporting, contact researchsupport@kth.se
• More information on when you need permits before you start your research such as ethical permits or export control permits, contact researchsupport@kth.se
• Support on research contracts: contact your local contract coordinator
• Find out what IT solutions and licensed software that are available to use in research

Contact KTH Research Data

We can help you with various questions about research data, from planning to publishing.

Email: researchdata@kth.se

More contact details for the library

More contact details for Research Support Office